Disclaimer: Twilight belongs to Stephenie Meyer. She messed up the story when she made Jake imprint on Nessie. Fortunately for us there's always the world of fanfictions.

Author/Note: This is a Leah/Jacob story with all the normal pairings and the events in Breaking Dawn never happened, because just like my cousin said, Breaking Dawn shouldn't even be considered a book.

Translation to English of O Nosso Amanhecer 2. This version was subjected to a few changes from the original in Portuguese.

This translation was a request by FantasyLover74.

I'm not a native English speaker so I'm sorry for my grammar and spelling. Thank you for reading and thanks the people who reviewed, FantasyLover74, She-Wolf Heiress, brankel1, Chick, Piper9004, Jo Harv, JacobLeah, CallyGreen, Mariaxxx, RobertForLife, Darkmaster of the arts, BenitaxoxoCastiel, mehr03, AllieBlack16, ItsCuzOfTheFame, brezzybrez, teamtorettosupporter, running with wolves, Blackwater Crazziii, DressageQueen14, Krizglass, akira m, bvc17, blackwater-forever, cyrusnjonas, Ketaaa15, roxymari.28, Sassy1515.

Alert: the characters in this story curse a lot.

Our Dawn

Part II

Leah Clearwater

23. Battle

Irina was strong, fast and lethal. I knew that better than anyone else. I had faced her once at the Cullen's house. That day I had almost lost my brother. I hadn't lied when I told him that he was one of the reasons why I was still in La Push with the pack. I wanted to leave when I first became a wolf, I wanted to be normal and my only chance was to stay away from the leeches thus stay away from home.

My father died and my boyfriend had left me so I actually didn't have anything to hope for. But Seth made me stay. He was too young, he was fatherless and he was also a wolf. No matter what it looked like, I loved him and that wouldn't change.

That was the reason why I panicked when I saw Irina running at the speed of light towards my brother. But I didn't have time to watch the outcome of her attack. Some of the Volturi had decided to follow Irina's example and they launched at us.

The attack hadn't been authorized by Aro or any of the other two Elders. It had been a spontaneous reaction and so the Volturi Guard didn't interfere. I watched as my pack brothers started to fight against the vampires. It looked pretty much like the fight against the newborns but these bloodsuckers were much more difficult to catch.

The Cullens weren't fighting because the Volturi hadn't attacked them. It was obvious they were only interested in killing us but they soon realised we weren't that easy to take down. Jasper had taught us many things about the way vampires used to fight and my brothers were dealing quite well with them.

Aro, Caius and Marcus were watching closely the fight but none of them ordered their men to retreat. I saw Edward and Carlisle exchanging a look which meant they were actually thinking about calling our reinforcements.

I was about to phase when Jacob held my wrist.

"No. You stay with the Cullens. I want you to follow my alpha command as soon as this turns into a bloody war, alright?"

"No! I'm going to help the pack!" I said remaining firm.

"No, you're not! I'm going to help them and you prepare to leave. I don't want you to fight. You can't phase and that's an order."

Jacob was way out of line. He had never forbidden me to fight before. I had no clue of what was going on. He phased and joined Quil and Seth while I just stood there unable to phase thanks to his alpha command. What did he mean by "I don't want you to fight"? I was a wolf for crying out loud.

He probably didn't trust me. I remembered Jasper's words about the Volturi attacking the weak first. I was the smallest wolf from the pack. He didn't believe I was capable of helping them. Tears of anger clouded my eyes. The fucking prick thought I was Bella Swan! Useless, weak and whiny. What the fuck!

"He has his motives Leah." Edward said. "Aro likes to collect rarities…special people."

"So?" I asked angrily watching Seth trying to bite Irina's head off and missing by an inch.

"You're special."

That caught me off guard. I was special? That was a good one.

A bitch? Hell, yes.

A harpy? Yes, that too.

A fucking freak? Absolutely.

A masochist? I guess that falling in love with an un-imprinted wolf matched that category.

But special? No way in hell.

"You're the only female wolf."

"The leech doesn't care about me." I stated.

"Because he didn't realise yet what you really are. Jacob is trying to protect you."

"And who's going to protect him?"

"He doesn't need that kind of protection." Edward reassured me. "Take a look."

It was true. It looked like after Jacob had joined the pack they had been able to focus better on the fight.

When more leeches threatened to join the fight, Emmett got impatient.

"Fuck this. I want to fight too." He said and then he joined the battle. Rosalie and Alice did the same.

I heard Carlisle tell Aro that he should call off his men but only when Jacob, Emmett and Sam destroyed three of his men, he decided it was time to interfere. By then all the Cullens were already fighting along with the pack except for Bella and Jasper. Eight of the Volturi were now dead.

"Jane…dear…let's just make them stop, shall we?" Aro ordered.

The blonde girl, who looked like an angel, stepped forward and smiled viciously.

"Pain…" She whispered.

I waited for my body to give in to the pain. Edward told us it was just an illusion but it was so powerful we would feel like we were burning up in flames.

Seconds later I still didn't feel any pain. Only then I realised the only ones screaming on floor in pain were the Volturi who had previously attacked us and Irina.

Jane was completely shocked because her power wasn't working properly on all of us.

"Alec…" She whined. "Try yours…"

The charming young man positioned himself next to his sister and tried to use his power on us in vain.

"It doesn't work." He noticed. "What is happening?"

Aro laughed and started to clap his hands.

"Well done, Isabella." He stated. "I always knew you'd be very powerful."

Jane glared at Bella with such intensity that I thought she was going to combust.

"Darling…can you stop please? You're hurting our men." Aro asked Jane.

The vampires ceased to squirm.

"Santiago, Felix…go get Irina." He ordered. "So, Bella…when did you learn to expand your power to protect others?"

"Not too long ago." She said. "I had never tried with more than two people actually."

Bella was smiling proudly and Edward joined her, completely surprised by her statement.

"I'm going to be waiting anxiously for the day you all come to join us." Aro said. "By the way…I'm sorry about my men…They'll be punished once we get to Volterra."

The sixteen survivors out of the twenty-four vampires who had attacked us kneeled down whimpering.

"Are we really leaving?" Caius asked. "They killed a few of us."

"We didn't order the attack. They were idiots and they acted on their own." Aro stated smiling at Bella. I guess he was trying to play the good guy to impress Bella and the rest of the Cullens. "I will be waiting for you my friends."

"Actually…" Alice said walking forward to meet Aro. "Bella joined our family quite recently. It's not even a year…we were hoping to have some time to teach her a few things and to have some fun together before going to Italy." She said in a mellow voice.

Aro smiled.

"Of course Alice. I understand…But it would be good to have you with us by the end of this century or the next one."

"That would be great." Alice smiled back. "Have a nice journey back home."

"Thank you."

"No! How can you leave like this?" Irina's voice was filled with anger and maybe even despair. She had done all for nothing.

"We can do whatever we want." Aro stated.

"They've killed Laurent, Natalia and eight of your men!" She yelled.

"You started this, Irina. My men didn't have to die today if it weren't for your reckless attitude."

"My reckless attitude? You're supposed to do the right thing to protect our kind."

"And that's precisely what we're doing."

"Irina…if you want to blame someone about what happened to Laurent, blame me." Bella said suddenly and Irina glared. "Laurent died because my friends were protecting me."

"Bella, you're not going to change her mind." Edward whispered. "Just like you couldn't change his."

Irina faced Edward and her yellowish eyes met his. It wasn't a glaring contest. Irina was just recalling the memories of her lost love.

"You begged him not to come when he told you he was coming to Forks to do Victoria a favour. But Laurent didn't listen to you…"

"I should've come too." She murmured and looked to the ground.

"You would've died." Carlisle said feeling sorry for her.

"Anything would be better than an empty life." She stated.

Out of the sudden, she looked at the Cullens as if she was apologising. Then she looked at the pack with an emotionless expression and freeing herself from the two vampires holding her, Irina took off.

Some of the Volturi Guard motioned to follow her but Aro stopped them.

"Let her go. If she returns to Volterra we'll deal with her."

"She won't be back to Volterra and she won't come here either." Edward said. Well that was a relief even though she didn't stand a threat to us if she was alone.

"Carlisle…it was nice to see you and your family. I hope you visit us some time." Aro said.

"Maybe we will." Carlisle replied with a warm smile.

Slowly, all the Volturi started to leave. Jane was the only one staying behind. She was beyond pissed off.

"One day…you'll regret this…alliance with the dogs." She said glaring at us. "Oh…and Bella? All powers have flaws…even yours."

"Sister? Come on…Aro is waiting for us." Alec came to take his sister. He held her hand and pulled her softly. "We'll see each other again…" He waved towards the Cullens.

The twins were the last ones to leave. We waited until all the black ropes disappeared from our sight and then the silence became too heavy.

"Is it over?" Emmett finally asked.

"Yes. It is." Edward assured.

The wolves started to disappear in the middle of the trees and soon Seth came to hug me.

"I can't believe we're alive." He said lifting me up. I scanned his body to see if he was injured but despite a few bruises he was fine.

The Cullens were also celebrating with kisses, hugs and handshakes. Before Seth put me down I saw Jacob and Bella hugging and then Edward giving Jacob a handshake.

"We need to start a fire." Carlisle announced. We needed to burn the bodies of the dead leeches. Paul took Martin, Gary and Collin and gathered the bodies. Then Emmett set the fire.

Embry, Quil, Jared and the rest came to stand besides me and my brother while Carlisle was watching the pack members who were injured. None of them inspired too much cares but Shane had a dislocated shoulder, Justin had a broken rib and Clayton had a pretty nasty injury on his right leg, but they would heal.

I waited anxiously for Jacob to come and speak to me. I was holding something special to celebrate our victory with him.

Before he could even open his mouth I prepared my right hook and hit him hard in the face.

"That was for giving me an alpha command!" I snarled. "And this…" I hit him again. "Was for not letting me help the pack just because you think I'm too weak to fight!"

Seth prevented me to hit Jacob a third time and Embry and Quil put themselves between us.

"What the hell?" Quil asked.

"What did you do to her Jacob?" Embry asked.

"I was just trying to protect you." He said cleaning the blood that was dripping from his lips with the back of his hand. "I'm sorry..."

"I'm not a fragile little girl…I'm a wolf like you!" Seth was still holding my waist otherwise I would be kicking and hitting Jacob like a crazy woman.

"Edward told me Aro could be interested in our pack, especially you since you're unique." Should I be flattered? I don't think so. I tried to free myself from my brother's arms but I failed. Since when had Seth become so strong?

"Asshole!" I spat.

"Fine…Next time, I'll let them take you too." He said.

"Enough." Sam ordered. "What's done it's done. The leeches are gone…that's all that matters."

I glared at him.

"Jasper, go get the others." Carlisle suggested. "Esme, can you please go home with Rose, Alice and Bella to prepare some food…I think we need to relax a bit." The four women left immediately. Seth released me slowly and I decided to behave, after all we should be celebrating.

Actually Carlisle had just spoken the magic words. Food. Esme's cooking to be more accurate. We all knew we would be extremely satisfied with the meal she was preparing.

We were soon joined by our reinforcements who didn't stay long. Now that the danger was gone they had no businesses to attend in Forks and they started leaving.

"Now that you two are over with your love's demonstration episode, can we go? I'm starving." Denis asked.

I smacked the back of his head and told him to be quiet.

"I was kidding." He whimpered.

Before Randall and Garrett could leave we felt the smell of four more leeches. But we knew these ones. It was, without a doubt, the Denali Coven.

They didn't like us much and we all took a defensive stance. The younger ones started to growl when Tanya, Kate, Eleazar and Carmen arrived.

"We don't mean troubles." Carmen announced. "We just want to know what happened…"

"We're actually sorry for not being here when you most needed." Tanya sounded sincere.

"It's fine. We understand." Carlisle said. "We were about to go home and celebrate with our friends. If you want to join us you're welcome."

It was simple. Carlisle was stating that the Cullens wouldn't choose the Denali Coven over us. If they wanted to accept our alliance, fine. If don't, their only option was to leave immediately.

"We accept your offer. We'll go with you and your…friends." Tanya said.

We left quietly and on our way to the Cullen's mansion we heard Carlisle and Edward explaining everything to the Denali's Coven. Carmen apologised about Irina's behaviour and the troubles she had caused to the Cullens, but she didn't mention us. I guess they were intentionally ignoring our presence.

We stayed out in the garden while the Denali joined the Cullens, Garrett and Randall inside. A few moments later Esme and Alice brought us some amazing food.

"What do they really want?" Sam asked curiously.

"To apologise for not helping us." Alice said.

"Are they going to try anything against us?" Jacob questioned.

Esme nodded negatively.

"As far as they're concerned Laurent had what he deserved. They didn't like him much because Laurent didn't actually try to be a…vegetarian." Esme explained.

"But they still don't like us…" Sam insisted.

"They don't understand our friendship." Alice stated. "But they accepted the terms that Carlisle told them."

"Which were?" I asked.

"Since we're allies, the Denali will agree not to harm you in any way and never set a foot on your lands without permission." Esme informed.

"Tell them we won't harm them since they're also vegetarian and if Irina quits her revenge plans…we won't kill her either." Jacob announced.

"Ok. Let's see what they'll say." Alice and Esme went home again and when they came back, the Denali were with them. Randall left shortly after saying he had businesses to attend in Virginia. Garrett decided to stay for a while.

"We don't have businesses to take care here and Irina's battle isn't ours." Tanya said. "We agree to have a truce with your pack because we respect Carlisle and we don't want to bring him more troubles."

"Fine by us." Jacob reassured them.

"Do you know where Irina is?" Carmen asked turning to Edward.

"No. I only know she seems to have lost interest in having revenge."

"Maybe she'll go home." Bella suggested.

Kate and Tanya nodded.

"Will the Volturi come back?" Eleazar asked.

"I don't think so." Edward said. "They have what they wanted."

"I'm sorry about that." Tanya said. "It could be worse, right?"

"Yes, they were actually inclined to kill the pack and take us to a trial but…things didn't go as they expected." Edward announced. "They also don't know that Alice's visions can change so even having predicted our incorporation in the Volturi Guard, the future can still change."

"We're glad no one got seriously hurt." Carmen said.

"Well we actually had our own secret weapons…" Edward smirked.

"Such as?" Seth asked.

"Jasper." Alice said with a smile.

We blinked. Jasper? How was that possible? He hadn't even fought the freaking leeches.

"The Volturi were counting on three important members: Chelsea, Alec and Jane. The twins would obviously take care of the attack after Chelsea controlled us." Edward told us.

"I didn't even notice Chelsea." Bella said in a low voice.

"Because she was neutralised immediately. Chelsea can manipulate emotions…so how can you fight someone who manipulates your emotions?" Edward grinned and exchanged a look with his blonde brother.

"You use an emotion's controller." I said.

"Exactly. That was Jasper's mission and if he failed things wouldn't be so easy. After that…our greatest weapon was Bella." Edward stated proudly. "I wasn't expecting her to be so magnificent."

It was Bella's turn to smile.

"I'm sorry I haven't told you about my power. I couldn't tell anyone because if Aro touched one of you like he did with Alice he would see everything…Only Jake and Leah knew." She explained.

Say what? I didn't know a fucking thing. Was Bella speaking another language? I looked at Jacob and he was as confused as I was.

"That day…when you and Leah caught us training in the forest…remember?" Bella asked Edward.

He nodded.

"We thought he had lost his powers or something." Jacob confessed.

"I was blocking our minds. I was so scared that Edward would scold me and think I was somehow betraying him that I reacted spontaneously. When I realised what I had just done, I wanted to tell someone but I couldn't."

"So you were training…" Edward concluded while hugging his wife tightly.

"It was her fault, not mine! She begged me…" Jacob said quickly.

"I believe you Jacob. Bella always knew how to be persuasive."

"We're really proud of you Bella." Carlisle stated making Bella smile widely.

"Jane was really pissed off." Emmett said. "Did you look at her?"

We all laughed.

"They won't bother us for a while." Jasper said. "The Volturi only act when they feel threatened."

"Caius did feel really scared when he saw Jacob phasing but since you're not monsters like the Children of the Moon, he won't try anything." Edward informed.

"So we can go back home, right?" Embry asked.

"Absolutely." Carlisle stated.

"We're going too." Tanya announced.

"If you hear from Irina, please tell us." Edward asked.

"Ok, we will." Eleazar reassured.

"You didn't forget about my proposal, did you woman?" Garrett turned to Kate.

She looked at him with a grin.

"If you want to come with us, I won't stop you but I'm not easy to tame." She smirked.

"I can handle wild, woman…trust me." Garrett said and before he could leave with the Denali he came to me and held one of my hands.

Jacob and Seth surrounded us immediately.

"He's not going to harm her." Edward said.

"It would never work between us, baby. I'm really sorry." He said smiling. Jacob growled deeply.

"Calm down dog, she's all yours now." Garrett winked and left following Kate.

Everything would be fine if Edward fucking Cullen hadn't chosen that moment to start laughing.

"What the fuck is your problem leech?" I snarled at him.

"You are hilarious." He said. Everyone was looking at us like we were crazy. "I don't know how the hell you can be so stupid."

"Jacob, maybe we should leave." Sam suggested.

"I guess." Jacob agreed.

I glared at Edward one more time and he just smiled. Stupid mind rapist. He was making fun of me because I was in love with my idiot teenage alpha. Great.

"Let's go home guys." Paul called and we all left running into the forest.

Since the danger was gone and we had all survived, I was left with too options. The first one was to act normally, ignore my feelings for Jacob and leave La Push like I had planned initially or I could tell him how I felt and probably be rejected again, which would be really not good to my self-esteem. I honestly didn't know what to do. Shit my life was damn complicated. I had just finished a battle against the Italian leeches and I was already battling with my own heart.

A/Note (2): See? No one died (except for the eight Volturi guys)...I hope I didn't disappoint you. Thanks for your support. Karisan :D